Showing posts with label jackpot 5. Show all posts
Showing posts with label jackpot 5. Show all posts

  • Introducing our first big winner: Rick Hausman takes down Jackpot5

    POSTED Aug 30, 2013 By Unknown
    Rick Hausman had a busy Sunday: drop his daughter off at college and play the Pacific Classic Stakes day card from Del Mar.

     And, oh, yeah: in between those big events he hit TwinSpires.com's new bet, the Jackpot 5, for $31,676.80 on a $243 ticket.
    "I knew I was four-for-four going into the final leg but didn't think I'd have the only ticket when the favorite won," Hausman said. "The favorite won, of course, and I figured all I had was 12 tickets for the show payoff and was hoping I got my money back on the bet. When I saw my account balance I couldn't believe it, and my my wife and I started dancing around like schoolchildren."

     Hausman won $31,552 for having the lone jackpot ticket (all five winners) and an additional $124.80 for having 12 show combinations. He's played the bet three times and has won on it each time, so he's definitely playing it again this weekend, though probably laying off Friday.

     "I'm a weekend player," Hausman said. "Work is going really well right now, so I like to focus on that then put my energy into playing on the weekends. I don't want to jinx myself, but I'm three-for-three playing this bet, so I got to keep playing, right?"

     Hausman's rainmaker from his Jackpot sequence was Catduel in race 8 from Calder (leg 2). The Chelsey Cat gelding was returning to turf after being rained off in his last two starts, and of his previous eight lifetime starts, his best Brisnet.com Speed Rating had come on the turf. Catduel outclosed 4-to-5 favorite Ant Hill (who Hausman also used) to set the wheels in motion for his big score.

     "I thought for sure with two horses paying less than $5 that there'd be other winners, but I guess [Catduel] was a real separator," said Hausman, who credits his grandmother and stockbroker David Foster--better known as owner-breeder of 1983 Kentucky Derby winner Sunny's Halo--with teaching him out to handicap.

     "My grandmother bred and raced horses, and I used to love going to the track with her and talking to her about racing," Hausman said. "I went to the 1997 Breeders' Cup at Woodbine and had the fortune of happening to sit with Sunny's Halo's owner [Foster].

     "He was old by then and died the next year. He wasn't seeing very well, so he told me to tell him who I liked and he'd bet. Well, at the end of the day he asked me how I did, and I said, 'Not to well; I hope you did better,' and he said to me, 'Kid, you're a great handicapper but a lousy bettor; I made $3,000 today betting your picks.'

     "And ever since then I've paid close attention to how I bet my picks. I always bet a top pick to win if he's 6-to-1 or better, and I used to bet every wager offered but realized I was doing better with the Pick 4s and 5s, so I stick with those. It certainly paid off with the Jackpot."

     The $31,676 score was Hausman's second-biggest to date. Amazingly, his bigger score also came on Pacific Classic day when Skimming in 2000 helped key a $53,112 payout for the San Diego-area businessman.

     TwinSpires.com offers the Jackpot 5 wager Friday through Sunday on its website. The bet kicks off this weekend's action with a $10,000 carryover. 80% of the pool goes to the show payoff with the other 20% toward the jackpot. Brisnet.com offers FREE Ultimate Past Performances and Daily Selections full-card analysis for the sequence every day.

  • The Jackpot 5 Show Parlay Opportunity

    POSTED Aug 22, 2013 By Unknown
    One thing I've tried to do lately is think of wagers as opportunities. If I'm not overjoyed at the chance to enter into a particular pool then it's not worth my money. Different pools can work together to offer multiple opportunities. E.g., the win pool can provide a way to hedge against uncovered opinions in a Pick 4.

    TwinSpires.com's Jackpot 5 wager offers multiple opportunities with one wager since 20% of the net pool goes toward the jackpot (only ticket with all five winners) and 80% goes toward the show pick 5 (any ticket with all selections finishing third or better), but one of the great things about the pari-mutuel system is that an opportunity for one could create a separate opportunity for another, as is the case with Jackpot 5 if you have some good opinions on who can finish third or better.

     Consider the first two sequences of the bet TwinSpires.com debuted last weekend:

     A show parlay on the five shortest-priced (to show) horses in the Jackpot 5 wager on Saturday, August 17, on TwinSpires.com would have returned $42 for an initial $2 investment. Those same five horses with Jackpot 5 came back $155.36 for a dollar.

     The same approach on Sunday, August 18, would have returned $7.87 for $2 but came back $7.92 for $1 via TwinSpires.com's Jackpot 5 wager.

     If you take the approach that you will not be the only winner if your five short-priced to show horses win, anyway, then there's no harm in punching multiple tickets on favored sequences.

     A five-race show parlay of horses who pay $3 each would return $15 for 13-to-2 odds. If you think each horse in your parlay has a 75% chance of hitting the board then the fair odds of completing the parlay is 7-to-2, so you're getting great value on a bet you'll lose ~76.27% of the time.

     But based on Sunday's Jackpot 5 results, which included a pair of horses who paid $2.10 (the minimum) to show, it's fair to assume that same parlay on $3 show horses could have returned $15 for a dollar. By targeting one aspect of the wager you've created tremendous value even while giving up on the jackpot.

     Yeah, it'd be awesome to take down the Jackpot, but part of the fun of the pari-mutuel system is knowing that when you won your peers have lost, and zigging with a show strategy when they're zagging toward a jackpot can be quite lucrative.

  • A-B-C-Deep on the Arlington Million day card at Arlington International Racecourse

    POSTED Aug 17, 2013 By Unknown
    You don't need a Ph.D. in Cristometrics to take a look at my ABC grid and figure out that I'll be leaning on the "A" column a lot.

     The internal conversation goes something like this, "If I'm using this horse then I have to use this horse." That's why Indy Point is a lone "A". I'm willing to bet that he's the horse many thinks he is, and 3-to-1 isn't a bar price for that opinion. But after him can I really use a horse like Finnegan's Wake (yes) but split hairs on Mull of Kilough and The Apache? No.

     So the hope is that I get at least two "A" horses home in the all-stakes $200,000 guaranteed Pick 4, and I'll probably need at least three such horses in the $100,000 guaranteed Pick 5. My selections for races 8, 9, and 10 are also good for TwinSpires.com Jackpot 5 purposes. The bet kicks off today with a $25,000 carryover and includes the Grade 1s from Arlington as well as races from Indiana & Louisiana Downs.

     Good luck to all those playing today, including Summer Showdown, Jackpot 5, and the great wagering menu on Arlington Million day at Arlington International Racecourse--a Pick 6, a Pick 5, three Pick 4s, and rolling doubles and Pick 3s.

  • Executive corner: Jeremy Clemons on Twinnovation, Jackpot 5, and TwinSpires mobile

    POSTED Aug 16, 2013 By Unknown
    TwinSpires.com Vice President of Marketing and Product Development Jeremy Clemons crashes the TwinSpires.com blog to all the great innovation that has come to TwinSpires.com this summer

    Pardon me while I highjack the TwinSpires Blog from the normal in-depth handicapping and racing analysis provided by Ed, Derek, and Frank, but I wanted to share some thoughts on a  few recent innovations at TwinSpires.com--what we call "Twinnovations" around here.

    Saturday marks the launch of a year’s worth concepting, developing, and investing in a new wager called JACKPOT 5.

    This Pick 5 wager is unique in that you get two wagers for your $1 base ticket.

    First, 20% of the funds are directed toward the Jackpot pool, which carries a unique ticket provision popularized by other Jackpot wagers such as Gulfstream’s Rainbow Six.

    Second, 80% of the funds are directed toward the Show Pick 5 pool which pays to any ticket with runners finishing third or better in all 5 races. This set up allows players to take a swing at the Jackpot while also having the potential to make a nice return in the Show Pick 5 pool.

    To jump start the wager, we are putting $25,000 of TwinSpires.com’s marketing dollars up to seed the Jackpot Carryover pool. Who doesn’t like an immediate overlay, right?

    The wager will consist of races from multiple tracks from across the country and will usually wrap up within 90 minutes. Free Brisnet.com Ultimate PPs and freeDaily Selections analysis is provided for each Jackpot 5 sequence (every Friday, Saturday, and Sunday following Saturday's launch).

    In addition to Jackpot 5, we recently rolled out a new web APP for smartphones that can be found by visiting m.twinspires.com from your smartphone or tablet browser.

    The initial feedback on our new mobile APP is extremely positive. The APP features performance improvements and a new wager pad that both greatly improve the speed of placing wagers via mobile device.

    Another highlight of the new TwinSpires Mobile APP is the addition of EZ Money Deposits.  Couple those upgrades with program information and live video and you literally can be Twinning from anywhere an internet connection is available, and more developments & improvements are coming!

    More information about the new TwinSpires Mobile is available here.

    We hope you like our latest creations, but if you don’t then that is OK too. Regardless, we want to hear your feedback about Jackpot 5, TwinSpires Mobile and all of our offerings. Please email us at player.services@twinspires.com with your thoughts.